See that's exactly why I want us to do some sort of space-engineering to make these things last longer.

I think that would take the charm out of it.

It makes me sad because we get so excited and plan so much and then it's gone by in a few minutes. In a way it's why I enjoy lunar eclipses so much, you can see the show and have time to take pictures, tell your friends to look up at the sky, etc. It's also why I enjoy blizzards more than other types of extreme weather like thunderstorms, they are gone by in a flash.

I'm actually of the view that the briefness of totality is a positive (to an extent). It doesn't give you time to get used to it, or for the awe to wear off too much. The briefness and rapidity of the change adds to the impact of it. Knowing that you only have a few minutes to take it all in suggests that you plan what to do with the time you have, as every second is precious and not something you'll get to enjoy again anytime soon.

Many people commented that it looked like a black hole in the sky. Perhaps a few even meant it in the sense of a gravitational black hole, like the rendition of Gargantua from afar in Interstellar. There is a resemblance, particularly in photos of the eclipse, but I think not so much to the eye with the way the corona streams out. I didn't really get the impression of looking at a literal black hole, but of something very alien and beautiful. It was hard to believe it was the Sun, too.

Also in reality a black hole's accretion disk would be blindingly bright. Much brighter than even the surface of the Sun. Probably not very pretty to look at without some eye protection.

Many people commented that it looked like a black hole in the sky. Perhaps a few even meant it in the sense of a gravitational black hole, like the rendition of Gargantua from afar in Interstellar. There is a resemblance, particularly in photos of the eclipse, but I think not so much to the eye with the way the corona streams out. I didn't really get the impression of looking at a literal black hole, but of something very alien and beautiful. It was hard to believe it was the Sun, too.

Also in reality a black hole's accretion disk would be blindingly bright. Much brighter than even the surface of the Sun. Probably not very pretty to look at without some eye protection.

That's pretty ironic that we would need eye protection to look at a black hole, but I see what you mean with it being like a cosmic particle collider of sorts with all kinds of dangerous radiation spewing forth from the accretion disk!

Another take, and at last I am very happy with this one and can consider the job done. (I know, it's been an obsession.)

This is two sets of exposures (inner and outer corona) with 5 images each, aligned (corona-wise, since the Moon moves) and stacked together to reduce noise, then HDR combined with Harbinger's method and enhanced with Espenak's radial blur method, followed by some further adjustment with layer masks and curves to achieve what I've been dying to do -- convert my brain's image into a digital image. Finally I can look at this and say "yes, that is what I remember seeing." The key was to get the bright ring, sufficient but not exaggerated detail in the spokes and plumes, their extent, and contrast against the background. Also not too over-sized, since of course the Sun/Moon is quite small on the sky, though in my memory it looks larger than life, perhaps because of the senses being in overdrive.